1776: Cool Considerate Men.

Not that we're ever overtly patriotic here on GreenCine, but certainly the 4th of July conjures up both a fondness for things Americana and thoughts (okay, brief thoughts) about our founding fathers. Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone's dated but still amusing musical, and its subsequent movie version directed by Peter Hunt, 1776 features some fine songs (who knew those founders could be so musically adept?) but one of the numbers from the film was excised from the theatrical version due to a complaint from then-president Richard Nixon (who soon would have a little less pull, but at the time was friends with producer Jack Warner).

The "Cool Considerate Men" sequence was more recently put back in the restored version of the film, as seen on DVD. The song allegedly drew parallels between opponents of American Independence in 1776 and the modern conservative movement. It doesn't seem all that thinly veiled, even. "Never to the left, forever to the right," they sing.

With our land, cash in hand Self-command, future planned And we'll hold to our gold Tradition that is old, reluctant to be bold.

[More on this on the LA Times from a few years back.] Happy Fourth! --craig phillips

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